


The Red Skates

by AppleSharon



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Ballet, M/M, Sleeping Beauty - Freeform, The Red Shoes - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-11-07
Packaged: 2019-01-07 14:20:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 1,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12234633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AppleSharon/pseuds/AppleSharon
Summary: At the Junior World Championships, Viktor Nikiforov is gifted a pair of red skates. They become both a blessing and a curse as he becomes further detached from figure skating with each passing year. Then he meets Yuuri Katsuki.Loosely based on The Red Shoes (both the movie and the Hans Christian Andersen fairytale). There will be a healthy dose of magical realism at times, as well as other references to fairytales and ballet performances.





	1. The Lilac Fairy

**March 2005, The Aud - Dom Cardillo Arena, Kitchener ON, Canada**

"You are a gift, Viktor Nikiforov."

The words of Lilia Baranovskaya — former Bolshoi Ballet prima ballerina and occasional spectator of Yakov Feltsman's latest pupil, if her teaching schedule allowed — ring in Viktor's ears. He removes his skate guards and pushes off. 

She is strict, harsh, and berates Viktor for his lack of discipline. 

She also says the words that Yakov cannot. Her face doesn't change — sharp, high cheekbones as if they were chiseled onto her face, perfectly symmetrical and her hair remains tightly pulled-back, as if she was still onstage, pulling thin black eyebrows up — when she speaks. She says this succinctly, with less emotion than Yakov, as if it was already fact. 

Viktor takes his position on the ice. 

The Lilac Fairy is a powerful force of good in Sleeping Beauty tradition. She cannot break Carabosse's curse, but she can save Princess Aurora's life. When Carabosse promises death, the Lilac Fairy ensures a peaceful slumber. When the kingdom teeters on chaos after Aurora pricks her finger on a destined spindle, the Lilac Fairy puts the entire kingdom to sleep. When she chooses Prince Désiré for Aurora, she guides him on his journey. She later blesses their union in the final act. 

If Viktor voiced his true opinion, he would say that he should be Aurora. He's spent sleepless nights thinking up different variations of The Rose Adagio for the ice rather than the stage. It's already renowned for its high degree of difficulty as a true test of grace and stamina and he, Viktor Nikiforov, wants to surpass that test and bring its series of promenades and balances to a new medium. He knows that he could do it. Only he can do it.

This is how he wants to announce his arrival to the world, as a peerless beauty to be courted. 

Viktor pouts prettily when Yakov assigns him his Lilac Fairy program. 

"It will be a surprise, Vitya," Yakov says. 

Viktor hadn't thought of it that way. 

The Lilac Fairy is effervescent yet somehow warm and motherly. She doesn't charm as much as she provides a constant reminder that there are forces of good at work in this world. Viktor isn't certain if he's ready for that responsibility. 

Yet, the music starts and so does he. 

Breathless and light, he ends with his arms outstretched. Viktor is a harbinger of hope. Unwittingly, he sets the tone for what will become his career. It will be years before he realizes that this too was his spindle, that he was lulled to sleep on that day.

At his assigned locker, Viktor opens the door to find a box tied with a red bow. He eagerly rips it off, opening the lid and pushing aside crinkling tissue. 

Inside the box is a gleaming pair of bright red skates.


	2. Coppélia

Viktor eagerly lifts the red skates from their box. The blades tear through the tissue paper and briefly Viktor wonders why Yakov hadn't included skate guards in with this gift.

Lilia had once commented on his elegant hands. "Too long for a child's," she had said before telling him to trim his nails, lest they catch on a piece of fabric. Viktor runs his index finger along the side of the blade. He doesn't wince as it draws blood. A thin red line appears on the pad of his finger, blood beading at the surface and falling soundlessly into the torn tissue. He wipes his finger on the box, the blood smear quickly turns a rust color.

The blades glint cooly. Viktor stares, entranced by their rosy color. Most blades gleam silver but these have a copper tinge. They are made to match the soft red leather of the skate boots, accented with red satin laces. Viktor squints his eyes. He sees red ballet shoes blurred across his fluttering eyelids. 

When he closes his eyes, he sees an older woman with delicate features and white hair. She is pale and smiles wanly. On her feet is a pair of red ballet shoes and she dances as if she can't help herself. She smiles broadly, but her eyes brim with unshed tears while she dances. Viktor brushes a tear from his own eye. 

Why is he crying? 

He looks around the locker room. It's filled with skaters warily taking off their skates, shrugging into team jackets following their programs before the sweat on their skin brought on chills and tremors. Viktor's eyes follow gold embroidery on a shiny red jacket. Team China. Cao Bin. Viktor shakes his head in an attempt to clear his mind. 

Unlacing his own skates — black with scratches deep in the leather — is a quick task. Lacing up the red skates is an even quicker task. Viktor can almost feel them molding to his feet perfectly. They are perfect.

These red skates belong to him, he thinks fiercely. No other skater can have them. 

"Vitya! What have I told you about accepting gifts from strangers?" 

Yakov's voice, curt and gruff, cuts through the locker room. The few other skaters inside wince. Viktor smiles, turning out his feet inward in the fifth position and gracefully extending his arms above his head. He doesn't say that he had thought the red skates were a gift from Yakov. Maybe he has a secret admirer. This idea coaxes a genuine smile out of Viktor. Even if they were from an obsessed fan, how could he not accept something so beautiful? How bad could a person be if their present was so rare and exquisite? 

It was as if they were telling Viktor that he is rare and exquisite as well. Even if he is the Lilac Fairy and not Aurora. 

Before Viktor can open his mouth in response, Yakov mutters something under his breath about sponsorships. 

"—And why don't you have your guards on? You'll ruin your blades!"

Absentmindedly, Viktor pokes the rubber, patchwork floor with his toe pick. Without saying a word to Yakov, he removes his white skate guards from his old, black skates and places them on the red skates. 

They look wrong. Viktor wants to take them off immediately and go back out onto the ice. His feet twitch inside the red skates.

That night, Viktor dreams of a young woman. At first, she appears as a doll, waxy complexion and dead, enamel eyes that stare into the distance. 

Then she begins to move. Viktor abruptly wakes up. 

"This is not a tragedy! This is a comedy!" 

Lilia Baranovskaya had told him this after watching his free skate. It was her only commentary on his performance.

Yakov had a few choice words to say regarding Viktor's slower interpretation and none of them complimentary. 

Viktor doesn't understand. He would be insulted if his lover fell in love with a doll. He wouldn't have saved him. 

Swinging his feet over the edge of the bed, he rises and dresses quickly. The red skates fit even better than the day before. 

He glides out of the door as if he is on the ice.


	3. Aurora

December 5, 2013, Marine Messe (Fukuoka Convention Center), Fukuoka, Japan

The skates are becoming more difficult to remove. 

At first, Viktor assumed it was his imagination. Staring up at the ceiling of his dormitory room, then a small apartment — his first space of his own — then his current, much larger, apartment, and now his hotel room in Fukuoka he can feel them calling to him. Sighing, he raises his arm above his head, blocking his eyes from the blank, white ceiling. It reminded him of his sparse home. 

His room is minimally decorated but pleasant enough and cold, like his own apartment. Modern furnishings give way to a large wall of glass that looked out over the city and a nearby park across the river. The jacuzzi bath is surrounded by lighted bamboo gardens and two circular windows with red trappings. It looks like a small version of one of the many temples he had seen in a brochure that was now casually tossed across his nightstand. He could take a bath. Or he could practice. 

Moments later, Viktor is out the door with the red skates draped over his back. 

The skates' blades never rust. They never need cleaning. They never dull. Not once in the eight years that Viktor has had them, through multiple Grand Prix assignments and five Grand Prix Finals victories, has Viktor ever paid any attention to them beyond lacing up the boots and rushing onto the ice. 

Viktor didn't think much of this until his coach had given him praise for their condition. 

"Your skates are in good shape, Vitya," Yakov had said. "Unlike the rest of you."

At the time, Viktor had preened under the gruff praise. Now thinking back on it, waiting for a taxi in the cool, damp evening, he should have been more cautious. 

No, he thinks. These skates have given him everything. 

He shakes his head. As he exhales, he can see his breath, a puff of white air in the cold mist. 

"It doesn't snow in Fukuoka, Vitya." He hears the voice of Yakov in his head.

Ten minutes and a stunted English conversation later, Viktor stands outside of Marine Messe at the Fukuoka Convention Center. He closes his eyes and breathes deeply.

In a few more minutes, he can wear his skates again. He'll be on the ice again. 

He'll be whole again. 

Viktor rushes through the entrance, quickly flashing his badge at the security guard that says he's allowed to practice after hours. The indoor arena is dimly lit and through the dark hallway, Viktor can hear a tinkling piano. 

A music box? Viktor thinks. No, something else. It's too cheery, and the notes are too loud. But the song is etched into his heart. He runs down the hallway towards the light, ignoring a pull at the back of his mind to put on his skates. 

Across the ice, a dark figure moves. Viktor squints. It's a young man, lit only by a few floodlights so he weaves in and out into the inky shadows at the edges of the ice. For a moment, an advertisement is illuminated behind him — IHI Realize your dreams — before he moves away and Viktor's eyes follow through a slow step sequence. Taken aback at the pacing, Viktor watches as the man pauses in attitude effacée derrière position, a balance. 

Aurora.

Deft and graceful, the figure glides into his next position. Another balance. Then another.

Viktor clasps his hands together with glee. He can see it — a person on the verge of adulthood, budding sexuality shy, curious, and then confident, coy. It's all there in the young man's movements. 

This is what he has been searching for. Perhaps he wasn't meant to be Aurora. Perhaps he was meant for something else entirely.

The music ends and the young man opens his eyes, looking directly at Viktor. The Russian champion watches as recognition dawns in the young man's brown eyes. Upon closer inspection, the man is a bit heavier than the average figure skater. He has bright blue glasses firmly attached to his head with a strap and messy black hair. His heavy breaths of exertion turn into a large gasp and he scrambles, stumbling his way into the darker corners of the arena.

"Wait!" Viktor cries out. "Please wait!"

He can hear the sounds of the young man's blades still. They echo in the empty arena.

Viktor looks down to find the red skates already on his feet, blade covers neatly leaning against the feet of the bench on which he had sat. Over the loudspeaker, another piano piece begins, bright and cheery. The echoes are gone. 

It's Tchaikovsky's "Waltz" from Act 1 of Sleeping Beauty.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a bit stuck in both my actual job and my other story for this fandom (which, although plotted out completely, I cannot seem to wrangle into something I like). This idea came to me, and will likely be a bit more freeform/ambiguous.


End file.
